Château des Guichardots

En un regard

Le château en bref

The Château des Guichardots is a neo-Gothic château built around 1875 by the architect René Moreau, on the site of a small earlier house at the place known as Les Guichardeaux, in Saint-Gérand-de-Vaux in the Allier. The site, occupied as early as the Bronze Age, has yielded archaeological remains uncovered by M. de Mimorin and kept at the museum in Moulins; the remains of a Roman camp, said to have served as the last halt before the Battle of Gergovia, lie nearby. The building, rectangular in plan, is flanked by two round towers and a large square pavilion; it combines light-coloured stone with red and black brick, and its façades are decorated with string courses and small arches in the neo-Gothic taste. The interiors, also designed by René Moreau, include wood panelling, stucco decoration, fireplaces, stencilled paintings, marquetry parquet floors and stained-glass windows, among them a window depicting an idyllic landscape added around 1900–1910. The château illustrates the lifestyle of well-to-do families of the Belle Époque. The whole ensemble, including its interior decoration, was listed as a historic monument (inscrit) by order of 14 June 2002. Privately owned, it is not open to visitors.